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in: New Hampshire, Oklahoma, 1986,
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Charles Vosseler

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Real Name: Charles Martin Vosseler
Aliases: Charlie Vosseler, Charles Foster, Charles Wilson, Charles Amidon, Charles Vosseler Jr.; he may use the middle name Malcolm
Wanted for: Kidnapping, Unlawful Flight to Avoid Prosecution
Missing Since: October 9, 1986

Case[]

Details: Charles Vosseler is wanted for abducting his sons, CJ and Billy, from their mother, Ruth Ann (Gotliebson) Parker. On October 9, 1986, Charles told Ruth that he was taking three-year-old CJ and two-year-old Billy to visit his aunt in Connecticut. Ruth kissed CJ and Billy goodbye, not knowing it would be the last time she would see them. Over thirty years later, she is still searching for them.
Ruth is from Wisconsin. In early 1981, when she was in her thirties, she met Charles through a personal ad in "Mother Earth News", a nature magazine. They initially communicated through letters and phone calls. A few months later, they met in person for the first time. He was everything she was looking for in a husband: honest, independent, intellectual, and a hard worker. He also loved the idea of living a "simple life" and starting a family with her.
Charles is an only child from Stafford Springs, Connecticut. He was interested in the stock market and health foods. He moved to Newton, New Hampshire because there was no state or income tax. He told Ruth that he had recently retired from his job as an elementary school teacher. When discussing how many children they wanted, he said a "classroom full".
Shortly after meeting Charles in person, Ruth moved from Wisconsin to New Hampshire to be with him. On June 30, 1981, they were married. A short time later, he sold their home and moved them to a small farm in Lubec, Maine. A year later, on December 9, 1982, CJ was born. Ruth says he was a sweet child who was eager to please.
Charles grew tired of Maine and soon moved his family back to New Hampshire, where he became a horse trainer. On April 21, 1984, Billy was born. Ruth says he was the opposite of CJ; his inquisitive nature often got him into trouble. Charles and Ruth adored CJ and Billy. But Charles made it clear to Ruth that she was responsible for raising them. He told her from the beginning that he "did not know how to do babies". He played and talked with them. But their daily care was Ruth's responsibility.
As CJ and Billy grew from babies to toddlers, Charles opened a real estate business in Rochester, New Hampshire. He flipped properties in New Hampshire with the help of his semi-retired parents, Charles Leon and Blanche. He would buy a house, move his family into it, work on it until it was ready to sell, and then move on to the next one.
Despite the upheaval of moving from house to house, the young family was content at first. Ruth says they were a happy and cohesive unit. Charles was kind to her, CJ, and Billy. But over time, things began to change. He started spending less time with them. He also stopped coming home every night. When he did come home, he would not speak to her.
Charles Leon and Blanche stayed with Charles and his family during the summer of 1986. He spent more time with his parents than with Ruth, CJ, and Billy. He also started making decisions on his own. Ruth says that on multiple occasions, he would make an afternoon of taking her, CJ, and Billy to visit a property. When she would ask him if they were buying the property, he would say no. But later on, he would buy it anyway.
Over time, Charles became controlling, confrontational, and impulsive. He refused to let Ruth return to her social work job, claiming she would become "too involved" and not have enough time for CJ and Billy. He told her exactly how much money he wanted her to spend at the grocery store. When friends would call to talk to her, he would tell them she was busy, even though she was not. He stole her mail. He even tried to make her think that her family had forgotten her.
Ruth says one of the final straws involved a property that Charles had bought in Rochester and planned to flip. She did not want to move into it because it needed a lot of work. It was dark and in disrepair. Bare nails were sticking out of the walls. She thought it was too dangerous for CJ and Billy.
In August 1986, Ruth and Charles agreed that she would move into an apartment in Rochester with CJ and Billy until the new house was repaired. Charles placed all of her possessions in a storage shed. He repeatedly made excuses for why he could not bring them to her. But she was unconcerned because she believed they would soon move everything back into their home and be together again. But that was not what happened.
One day, Charles came to the apartment and told Ruth he had filed for divorce. She felt completely blindsided, as he had not mentioned anything about it before. She asked him about custody of CJ and Billy. He said he could not recall what he wrote down about it. He also could not remember the name of his lawyer, when the papers were filed, or anything of that sort. At that point, she was alarmed. She decided to find her own attorney.
According to Ruth, Charles did not seem concerned about having custody of CJ and Billy. In fact, in his divorce petition, he did not ask for it. He seemed more concerned about child support payments and assets – who got what possession, who had access to whose income.
Following the divorce filing, CJ and Billy spent most of their time with Ruth. She found work at a fast-food restaurant. At first, her niece watched CJ and Billy while she worked. Then, Charles told her that he could care for them. However, most of the time, he left them with Charles Leon and Blanche. Sometimes, he did not return them on time to Ruth. She hoped that a legal custody agreement would be worked out. But he was evasive about the progress.
On the morning of Thursday, October 9, 1986, five days before their first divorce hearing, Ruth got ready for work and got CJ and Billy ready for a visit with Charles. She remembers that they did not want her to go. She tried to calm them down and tell them Charles would be coming soon. She says if she had known it was the last day she would spend with them, she would have given them more hugs and kisses instead of worrying about being late.
Ruth left CJ and Billy with a babysitter. Later that morning, Charles picked them up. Ruth believed he was taking them to their old house and possibly Charles Leon and Blanche's home. He had told Ruth he would return them on Saturday. However, on Friday evening, he called her and said he had decided to visit his aunt in Connecticut. He said he would be a bit late returning them. On Saturday, he called again and said that they were having fun and wanted to stay with him until Monday. She could hear them in the background, but he did not let her talk to them. That was the last time she heard from them.
When Charles, CJ, and Billy had still not returned Monday morning, Ruth was concerned. At 11am, she went to his office to try and figure out what was going on. The door was locked, and the office was empty. An employee came out with a box of office supplies. He told her that Charles had sold the business over the weekend and gave the employees a five-minute notice before laying them off and closing the office.
Ruth realized that Charles had abducted CJ and Billy. She drove fifteen miles to her attorney's office. She says she was in abject panic and complete shock. During the drive, she tried to calm herself down and not fall apart emotionally. The first people she called were Charles Leon and Blanche. They denied knowing anything about the abduction and said they were shocked by the whole thing.
Ruth knew she needed to provide photos of CJ and Billy when she filed a missing persons report with the police. She went to the storage unit that held her possessions. When she got there, she was shocked to find it empty. Charles had sold everything at auction months earlier. She then discovered that he had removed all the photographs from her apartment and his house, along with other documents such as letters, Christmas cards, and birthday cards. He even took the photos from her wallet. As a result, she had no recent pictures of CJ, Billy, or Charles.
Ruth says Charles took everything: all the money in their bank accounts, their address books (so that it would be hard for her to contact his family), their furniture, and even the Bible her grandmother gave her for confirmation. He also turned off automatic payments for her car, which almost led to it being repossessed. But most importantly, he took CJ and Billy.
Ruth considers Charles to be a cold, calculating, heartless sociopath. She says he does not care about anyone else's feelings. She believes he considers CJ and Billy his possessions rather than his children. Based on his behavior, she theorizes that he took them because they were "his" and he wanted control over them.
The Parental Kidnapping Prevention Act went into effect in 1981. But when CJ and Billy were abducted in 1986, many states, including New Hampshire, were still slow to consider a parent taking their child as an issue worthy of police intervention. They assumed that the child was safe and with someone who loved them. Since Charles was CJ and Billy's father, the police initially did little to help Ruth find them.
Ruth reported CJ and Billy missing at the Rochester Police Department. While there, officers kept asking her about her car. She did not understand why. Finally, the police sergeant told her there were clear-cut laws for stealing cars but none for stealing children. At the time, the United States had a national network to find missing cars but nothing similar for missing children. There was also poor communication between the agencies that handled those cases.
The police told Ruth that the chances of finding CJ and Billy were unlikely if there were no pictures of them. She asked her friends and family to search for any pictures they might have. Finally, one of her coworkers remembered that she had videotaped her children during a company picnic and may have panned past CJ and Billy since they were at the same table. She reviewed the tape and found that CJ and Billy were in the video for thirteen seconds. The police obtained grainy still images of them from the video.
At a hearing conducted on October 17, 1986, Ruth was granted temporary custody of CJ and Billy. On February 5, 1987, New Hampshire state police charged Charles with interfering with custody. On April 3, a federal warrant was issued for his arrest for unlawful flight to avoid prosecution. The FBI followed up on tips from various police departments and missing child groups, but Charles always seemed to be one step ahead of them.
From 1986 to 1988, Charles, CJ, and Billy were spotted in many states throughout the country, including Rhode Island, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Maine, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Florida, and South Carolina. Charles was attracted to country life, and his tracks led investigators to many rural areas. He was also reported to be armed and leading a survivalist existence.
Surprisingly, Charles called his attorney several times in the months following the abduction and tried to get custody of CJ and Billy. However, he never revealed his whereabouts. Around that time, Charles Leon and Blanche filed a civil complaint against Ruth, claiming she abused CJ and Billy. However, there was no evidence to support the claims. Anonymous mailings were sent to Ruth's family, alleging "improper behaviors" on her part. She believes they came from Charles.
In the summer of 1987, Ruth's father, Gisle Gotliebson, was diagnosed with terminal cancer. After contacting the local media, he appealed to Charles, asking him to let CJ and Billy contact him before he died. He felt he had a good relationship with Charles and hoped his plea would convince him to return CJ and Billy. The plea was shown on local and national news. However, Charles never responded, and Gisle passed away a short time later.
Ruth says that following the abduction, she was a mess. She rarely slept. When she did fall asleep, she had nightmares. In the nightmares, she could hear CJ and Billy calling for her, but she could not find them. She wanted to know where they were and who was caring for them. She says she did not have the choice of falling apart. She knew she had to keep herself together so that she could focus on searching for them.
Frustrated with the lack of effort that the authorities seemed to be putting into the case, Ruth began to fear that she would never see CJ and Billy again. She decided to take matters into her own hands. She spent hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars searching for them herself. She also contacted her friend's husband, Monty Curtis, a private investigator. He told her that he would do whatever he could to help out.
In 1988, Curtis tracked down and interviewed Charles' friends and business acquaintances. He also conducted surveillance on Charles' family members. But Charles left no clue as to where he took CJ and Billy. Curtis helped post missing person flyers around the country. A few months later, a promising tip came in.
On August 8, 1988, an organization called "Child Find" received an anonymous tip from a woman in Stillwell, Oklahoma, who had seen CJ's picture on a "Child Find" poster. She believed she knew CJ, Billy, and Charles' whereabouts. "Child Find" contacted Curtis because they knew he had worked on the case. He believes Charles went to Oklahoma because it is remote. Also, at the time, the state had paper driver's licenses (with no photo ID).
The tipster said that Charles was her boyfriend. He had changed his name to "Charles 'Charlie' Wilson", the name of a friend from college. He also changed CJ and Billy's last names to "Wilson". They lived on a farm just outside Stillwell. Charles homeschooled CJ and Billy and made them live in isolation. He told his girlfriend not to ask questions about CJ and Billy's mother. Others who knew him in Stillwell said they did not know he even had children, apparently because he kept them isolated.
Curtis passed on this information to the FBI. But before they could investigate, someone apparently tipped Charles off, leaving a note in his post office box that said, "Uncle Sam is coming". When FBI agents arrived at his residence nine days later, they discovered that he had fled, but not before setting his vehicle and house on fire. Curtis believes that Charles burned the house down to destroy any evidence that could lead to his whereabouts.
Ruth took time off work to follow up on this lead. An FBI agent called and told her to get her paperwork in order because they planned to fly her out and have her pick up CJ and Billy within twenty-four hours. She thought everything was all set. Then, she received a phone call saying that Charles, CJ, and Billy were gone again.
After Charles fled Stillwell with CJ and Billy, decades passed without another sighting. Ruth does not know how he has successfully kept them hidden. She says she has days that are not great. She has days where she can put what happened behind her and do what she needs to do to move on with life. It is difficult for her when months go by without leads. It is particularly difficult when a lead looks good but turns out not to be viable.
Ruth later returned to social work. In the mid-1990s, she moved to North Carolina. She later remarried and became a stepmother to her husband's children. But she has never forgotten CJ and Billy.
During his years investigating this case, Curtis has learned as much as he can about Charles. He hopes that clues about Charles' personality will help him find CJ and Billy. He says Charles is unique, intelligent, charming, and a "malignant narcissist". He thinks Charles looks at everyone else as a tool rather than a fellow human being.
Curtis learned that Charles had been married twice before Ruth. When he divorced his first wife, he told her she was lucky they had no children because he would have taken them away from her. Curtis believes that Charles deliberately chose Ruth to have his children because of her good background and high intelligence but planned to keep them for himself.
Curtis says Charles took a premeditated and meticulous approach toward abducting CJ and Billy. He planned it for at least six months, starting shortly before the divorce filing. Ruth believes that he prevented her from returning to her social work job so that she would not have an income or a support system. She also believes that he purposefully separated her from her friends and family.
Along with selling his real estate business, Charles systematically converted his assets to cash, assisted by Charles Leon and Blanche. He bought and sold several properties and placed money in separate accounts without Ruth's knowledge. He sold his beloved horse, which she says he "could not live without". In total, he took about $80,000.
Ruth says that Charles removed her name from almost everything, including property holdings, credit cards, and their joint bank account. As a result, she could not take money out. Stripping her of her resources made it harder for her to chase him during the early years. But his ability to live off the grid, speak multiple languages, and charm those he comes into contact with has kept authorities from discovering his location over the past three decades.
Ruth says that Charles' impression of law enforcement and the "rules of life" was that they were for the less intelligent people that needed rules to get along. He did not need them because he was brighter, quicker, and faster.
Not only has Charles been able to elude authorities for decades, but he has also managed to keep CJ and Billy away from anyone who might reveal the truth to them. He likely received help from his family. After their initial interview with the FBI, Charles Leon and Blanche refused to cooperate with authorities. Curtis thinks they aided Charles in his initial efforts to get CJ and Billy out of New Hampshire. Curtis is unsure if they knew they were doing anything nefarious at the time.
Ruth is certain that Charles Leon and Blanche, who were somewhat wealthy, helped Charles escape with CJ and Billy. She says that after she confronted Charles Leon with receipts and credit card bills that she had located, he confessed that he had driven around with Charles in various parts of New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and Rhode Island in the first few weeks following the abduction. He claimed he tried to convince Charles to take CJ and Billy back to Ruth. Blanche stayed behind to deal with the sales of the real estate business and Charles' house. Although Ruth and Charles lived in that house, Charles Leon and Blanche told her that they owned it.
Over the years, there have been some reported sightings of Charles. One of his ex-wives believes she saw him on a flight from Boston to Dallas in 1998. He was reportedly in Oklahoma in December 2006. Then, more than two decades after last seeing her children, Ruth received a lead that Charles, CJ, and Billy were possibly living in another country. However, the lead came from a questionable source: Charles Leon and Blanche. Charles Leon told an FBI agent that he had seen Charles two times. Once, he and Blanche had driven through Mexico to South America and met Charles in a small town.
Charles Leon said the last time he saw Charles was at a train station in Stuttgart, Germany. He said that encounter occurred many years ago, and he had not seen Charles since. He alluded to the fact that CJ and Billy were with Charles on both occasions. Charles Leon and Blanche have since passed away. Curtis thinks Charles may be living somewhere internationally. Charles is fluent in Spanish. Curtis speculates that Charles is living in a remote country in South America with limited access to the Internet and media.
CJ and Billy would now be full-grown adults, possibly with their own children. Why have they not searched for Ruth at some point in their lives? She notes that they were very young when they were abducted. She is unsure what memories they would have of her, if any. She believes Charles told them she died.
Ruth recalls that before the abduction, Charles had told CJ and Billy that their kitten, who lived at his home, had died. He later had a funeral for the kitten. Ruth later learned that the kitten was alive and at Charles Leon and Blanche's house. She believes he did this as a "rehearsal" for telling CJ and Billy that she had died.
Curtis thinks that Charles either told CJ and Billy that Ruth died in a car accident, that she did not want them, or that she was mentally unstable. Curtis theorizes that if Charles told them these things at a young age, they would believe him. Curtis says CJ and Billy do not know who they really are. They have lived their whole lives under assumed names, so they have no reason to believe that they are actually missing.
Curtis hopes that people who know Charles, CJ, and Billy's current whereabouts will come forward. He thinks the fact that Ruth is still trying to find them shows how strong she is. He notes that it has taken a toll on her. He says that unsolved cases like this one haunt him and keep him up at night. He wants Ruth to be able to see CJ and Billy again, or at least know that they are okay.
Ruth hopes that CJ and Billy are fine, happy, well-adjusted adults with wonderful families of their own. She is concerned that if they were raised by Charles, they would be as emotionally crippled as he is. She hopes they will get curious and submit their DNA to an ancestry website someday. She and several of her family members have submitted their DNA to those websites in the hopes that they can locate CJ and Billy through them. Ruth says that as a mom, she will not give up on searching for CJ and Billy until she knows that they are safe. She says it is not a choice. She is doing what she needs to do.
Charles is a white male, and when last seen, was 6'1", weighed 220 pounds, and had brown hair and blue eyes. He was born on March 6, 1942. He may use the alias dates of birth March 6, 1943 and/or February 6, 1944. If he is still alive, he would be in his eighties. He was last known to be driving a 1979 GMC Jimmy truck with the Nebraska license plate number 2R6093 or the Virginia license plate number IBV565. He should be considered armed and dangerous.
Charles may be living off the grid in the United States, South America, or Europe. He has previously lived in Elizabeth, New Jersey; Saint Petersburg, Florida; Earlimart, California; Fort Smith, Arkansas; and Stillwell and Tulsa, Oklahoma. He also has ties to Pennsylvania and Connecticut. He may have remarried or is in a relationship. He has worked as a real estate agent, teacher, and antique dealer.
Charles has most likely changed his name, and, of course, his appearance has changed over the last thirty years. But he cannot escape one recognizable physical characteristic: nystagmus, a rapid eye movement in a horizontal fashion. Also, his right eye twitches when he is stressed. He is also known to stand and hang his head slightly to the right or left when he is talking to or listening to someone. His head bobs slightly up and down when he concentrates. He may wear eyeglasses or contact lenses. He is also a hypochondriac.
There is a $25,000 reward for information leading to the resolution of this case.
Extra Notes:

  • This case was first released on the June 8, 2022 episode of the Unsolved Mysteries Podcast.
  • It was also released on November 1, 2022 as a part of the third volume of the Netflix reboot. It was released in the third part of a three-week Halloween event. It is featured at the end of "Abducted by a Parent" as a part of a Parental Abductor Roll Call alongside Regina Martinez, Foong Chin, Heather Unbehaun, Reuben Blackwell Sr., Francisco Flores, and Susan Zaharias.
  • It was also profiled on Deadline Crime with Tamron Hall, Missing, and Missing: Reward.
  • Some sources state: Charles and Ruth met in 1980; she was in her twenties when they met; they were going around the country and flipping houses before CJ was born; Charles, CJ, and Billy disappeared four days before the divorce hearing; and they were in Oklahoma in 1987.

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